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Today I learned that buoyant inflatable balloons have been around a lot longer than I thought.
by elihu 5y ago
Today I learned that buoyant inflatable balloons have been around a lot longer than I thought.
- aasasd 5y agoPretty sure floating under giant balloons was a vaguely regular pastime of wealthy people in the nineteenth century, and perhaps earlier.
- tempodox 5y agoThe Montgolfier brothers demonstrated the first hot-air balloon in summer 1783. They also invented parachutes. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montgolfier_brothers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montgolfier_brothers
- hutzlibu 5y agoAnd a good reminder to keep your plans simple. "In fact, on that morning, his friends had discovered that there was not a single red balloon for sale in all the markets of St. Petersburg. At length, they obtained an old one from a child, but it no longer flew. In desperation, they bought a red rubber ball and attempted to inflate it with hydrogen; but when they released it, it floated only a few feet up, stopped just short of the top of the courtyard wall, and drifted back down to them. Finally, they tied it to the top of a woman’s umbrella, and she walked back and forth on the street, holding the umbrella as high above her head as she could—but not high enough".
- Someone 5y agoI don’t think the article states it was inflatable. It still may have been, though. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toy_balloon#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toy_balloon#History: “The first rubber balloons were made by Professor Michael Faraday in 1824 […] Latex rubber toy balloons were introduced by pioneer rubber manufacturer Thomas Hancock the following year in the form of a do-it-yourself kit consisting of a bottle of rubber solution and a condensing syringe. Vulcanized toy balloons, which unlike the earlier kind were unaffected by changes in temperature, were first manufactured by J.G. Ingram of London in 1847 and can be regarded as the prototype of modern toy balloons.”